


Strength

by EmeryHalt



Category: Dungeons & Dragons (Roleplaying Game), Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types, Original Work
Genre: Crying, Dreams, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Recovery, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Magic, Men Crying, New Family, Physical Abuse, Recovery, Slow Burn, Whump, woman comforts man
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-30
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:14:08
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28425306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmeryHalt/pseuds/EmeryHalt
Summary: Strength:Noun1. the quality or state of being physically, mentally, emotionally, or spiritually strong.2. the capacity of an object or substance to withstand great force or pressure.3. a good or beneficial quality or attribute of a person or thing.4. the number of people required to make a group complete.
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Male Character
Comments: 1
Kudos: 3





	1. Chapter 1: Perpetual Dusk.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Daze relies on her routine to help her though the day and Nempori sees a familiar face in is favorite part of the day.

* * *

“On a scale from one to ten, how bad would it be if I-“

“At least a twenty.” Callissa cut her off and barked a laugh as she wiped the blood from her broad sword and re-sheathed it. She stepped over the corpse of the goblin she had just slain and slumped to the ground beside the leth half-elf rouge.

“Really?! I didn’t even say it yet!” Daze said as she frowned and outstretched her injured limb away from the blood soaked battle they had just won.

“Pretend like we’ve known you for more then five minutes Daze.” Opium chimed in as his fingers shifted over Dazes slashed leg. He sat on his knees in front of her and pointedly ignored Dazes glare. Daze was nimble but a goblin had landed a sharp blow to the vulnerable spot in the thick leather armour covering her left thigh.

“-who’s side are you on Opi?!” Daze cut in, but any further scolding was cut off by her clenching her teeth as Opiums deft hands worked at patching the wound. His fingers glimmered with magic as he worked and her leg began to heal at an enhanced pace. 

Opium chuckled and stood after a few moments dusting his hands off on his legs. Although he was on his feet, he was only as tall as Daze while she was sitting. The height difference didnt seem to bother Opium though as he smirked at her.

”You know how I am, I just say it how it is.” He ducked just narrowly missing the smack Daze was about to deliver and backed up out of her reach. Callissa laughed again as Daze flushed and began to patch her pant leg up enough to travel again.

”Stop messing around you three, we need to get out of here before more show up.” Gor-el hissed at them. Daze would have felt immediately intimidated by the large Half-Orc Paladin had she not seen him cry over stray kittens multiple times. Still, his words were enough to silence them as they quickly finished patching themselves up. It had not been an easy battle despite the five of them being accomplished adventures. But Daze felt proud nonetheless. Twenty to five was a pretty big accomplishment.

”Gor is right, we should probably find somewhere relatively safe to camp tonight that’s not near a goblin battlefield.” Thalia pitched in as she shimmered and turned back into her regular human form. Her dark skin glimmered with residue from her transformation from lioness back to human. She dusted her clothes and pushed some of her braids from her face, revealing the white swirling tattoos of her Druid circle edging her face and disappearing under her clothes as the trailed down her neck.

Daze nodded and pulled her hood up, obscuring her vibrant silver hair. It was rather hard to scout unnoticed with a glowing beacon on your head.

“Same formation?” Daze asked as she slung her bow over she shoulder and pulled out her dagger. The others nodded and Daze, despite having a serious wound on her thigh minutes ago, now darted at an incredible pace low to the ground. In seconds sne seemed to meld with the shadows around her.

Daze attributed her natural finesse in stealth to her Elven heritage but it was her human determination that had helped her perfect it into an art form. She moved silently as she kept 90 yards a head of the group. Far enough that she could scout but close enough that they were in range for her to communicate telepathically with them through their rings if need be.   
  


It was quiet though. Eerily so as she scouted a head while the group followed behind as Daze gave the all clear every once in a while. The whole place felt unnatural to Daze, but maybe that was just because she was used to the background noise of the forests she grew up in. This was different and had all of them on edge constantly, but they didn’t expect much else when they had entered the Underdark. They had picked up a bounty from a King in the area for a reward that would keep them in luxury for at least a decade. It was an offer hard to pass up.

Daze shook her head to clear her mind, she had to be focused completely on her surroundings. She could wonder later what their bounty had done to anger a king so badly that the reward was well beyond a small fortune.

Eventually, around what Daze presumed to be dusk, she found a patch of gnarled but ultimately harmless grove of trees off path where they could set camp for the night to rest. It was a perpetual dusk here and Dazes sense of time was her own internal clock now as she relied on it to follow her years of routine despite the last of sun.   
  


They set up camp with a speed that demonstrated years of practice. Routine. Daze found the site and began to prepare a fire whilst Opium created a magical hut around them making them invisible to anyone on the outside and masking any evidence of their presence. The others set to work setting up bed rolls and menial tasks that needed to be done at every camp site. Within 30 minutes everyone was settled in with a warm stew cooking over a warm fire.

Dazed thanked what ever deity that Opium followed that he was with them. The small dwarven cleric always saved a bit of his magic so they could have a secure spot to rest every evening that was completely hidden. This also included being able to have a fire and warm meal where in other circumstances they would have been stuck with cold rations and a dark night. The invisible protective hut was a luxury Daze appreciated.

Callissa took first watch like usual, but unlike usual, they had taken to staging in the hut during watch to keep themselves invisible to anything lurking in the night. The underdark was an unpredictable place and your watch was more likely to get you discovered away from the invisible hit then out and scouting the perimeter like they usually had done.   
it was a little cramped, doing everything they usually did inside the huts barriers but it was safe and that was what mattered right now.   
  


They weren’t stupid. They knew that there was a good reason no one else took up the call when the king offered the bounty. But they had had a lifetime of experience doing risky thing and they were widely known for their effectiveness as skilled adventures. Despite their risky quests, they knew when to play things safe, in large amount because of Gor-el and Opium. They kept the others in check and kept them safe over the past five years.

Gor-el with his level head and protective nature and Opium with his magic and healing. Daze never said it out loud but she was grateful to have them as her friends and protectors.   
  
Daze glanced up from where she lauded curled in her bed roll to Callissa as she stood watching out the one-way walls of the hut like a solid red and black stone-statue. Daze followed the lines of the tiefling woman’s deep red skin to where is disappeared under black armour as she drifted off to sleep. She knew Callissa would wake her in a few hours for her shift and until then she would be watched over as she fell asleep in the foreboding underdark amongst the people she calls home.

...

  
  


“Daze. Wake up!” Callissa shook the shaking half-elf awake and Daze shot up like a bolt. Callissa caught her and held her shoulders firmly as Daze tried to collect herself.

”You’re still having nightmares aren’t you.” Callissa stated with more of a statement then question. Daze leaned into her friend hold as she drew in deep breaths. The teifling woman seemed to always radiate a comforting warmth and it helped ground Daze now.

”Its getting worse the longer we are here. He begs me to help him and every time I get close to breaking the chains, I get ripped away and I can’t free him.” Daze mutters as she struggles to her feet. 

“I wish I could help Daze.”   
  


Daze only nods in response as she takes up her post as look out and Callissa stretches out onto of her bedroll and quickly falls asleep.   
  


Daze looks around at the eerie forest surrounding them watching for any threats. She thinks back to her dream and how the man, no older the she was, clung to her as he cried and she struggled to break the chains that kept him tethered by his ankle to the floor. The metal never gave though, not truly, no matter how hard she tried. So she would hold him as she soothed the various injuries he sported in each dream. It was always the same things, she’d comfort him as he begged her to free him and she would struggle and fail to fulfill the request.   
But the dreams were different in the way his injuries were never the exact same as he seemed to age with her as the years passed. He had frequented her dreams irregularly and she had only a hand full of memories where he seemed less distressed then usual. They would talk then, but whenever she would get details like a name or his location they faded as she woke in the morning.  
  


She always awoke shaking and with a deep sense of helplessness after these dreams. They had always had the feel of a memory rather then a dram but Daze knew since the moment they started 15 years ago that she had never met this man.   
  


In fact she had never even met a dark elf, a _drow_ , at all in her life.

  
And despite the large reward from the king to come here on this mission, Daze and her whole group knew that she would have jumped at the opportunity regardless of the reward if it ment she could finally find the boy haunting her dreams.

...

Nempori curled in on himself more as he lay on the cold mildew ridden floor. He wrapped his arms around himself trying to recall the sensation of the soft arms that had held him in his dream. His dreams were the best part of his day. He felt cared for a safe enough to cry. Looking back, he couldn’t remember the last time he cried in from of someone other then the woman in his dreams.   
He clung to every second of those dreams, Praying to whatever merciful deity out there that would listen that someday that woman from his dreams would actually free him.

Nempori, he hated that name, pressed his eyes shut tightly as he tried to conjure the face of the woman who was his solace in his sleep. Remembering her helped him sleep better despite his awful conditions. He hoped she was real, he had never seen a light skinned woman before, so he knew he’d never actually met her before. He hoped she would find him soon; but if not,

he hoped that someday someone would find him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope y’all like it! This is my first work on here.


	2. Chapter 2: Unexpected

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When they thought of finally meeting the person in their dreams this wasn’t quite what either had in mind.

* * *

  
Daze groaned as she blinked awake for the second time. Her watch was uneventful and she had went back to sleep after waking Thalia to take over.

The others shuffled around that small set up packing their belongings as Opium handed out some dry rations for breakfast. They had the luxury of a hot meal in the evenings but in the morning when the spell was close to eating off, they stuck to cold rations to avoid the plume of smoke that their fire would leave without the protection of the hut.

”I can’t wait to get out of here. This perpetual dusk is exhausting.” Thalia muttered as she sat down beside Daze with a handful of dried meat and her canteen. Daze finished packing her last few items and strapped on her quiver before she sat beside the small human woman.

”I whole heartedly agree. I don’t like how quiet it is here, it’s unnerving. I feel like I’m about to be jumped at any moment.” Daze watched as her rations floated over to her, still amazed by things her invisible magic hand she could do. Magic always amazed Daze though, even if it was her own.

”We are getting close to where they suspected Neptune to have gone.” Gor-el stated as he looked over the crudely made maps they were given for this bounty. Not many people had ventured into the underdark, and those who did did not take much time to map everything out. They had added a considerable amount to this map already and notes about dangers in the area, but it was better then nothing and they hoped the large Dark elf settlements placements were at least a bit more accurate.   
  


“How far out are we?” Daze asked as she looked at Gor-el, his shining silver armour was covered by a thing brown fur cloak and Daze always wondered how he was able to move as well as he did with so much weight in the form of clothing on him. His eyebrows scrunched as he calculated the distance between them and their destination. Daze just watched and could practically see his mind work as she waited patiently for him to answer.   
  


“We should be there by dusk,” he used air qoutes at the word dusk, “that is if we aren’t attacked at all on the way there.”   
  


The others nodded and finished off their breakfast as Gor-el rolled the map up and stowed it in a pouch at his waist that appeared much to small to fit the large parchment. He stood, adjusted this hair which was gathered in a messy bun atop his head to hold his thick curly black hair from his face, and then extended a hand down to Opium who had been sitting beside the large half-orc.   
  


They finished packing up camp and we’re on their way, having only spent and hour from waking till they were on the move again. Same formation, same routine. Daze noted though that the potential dangers they had faced and narrowly avoided because of her keen eyes were much less now compared to when they first entered the underdark. It seemed to be a gradual thing and Daze had a feeling that the goblin attack yesterday was more of an anomaly then a usual thing for this area. She took that as a sign that they were getting close to some kind of settlement.   
  


_Keep an eye out for scouts and watches, I have a feeling we’re are going to see some drow today before we get to the town_. Daze twisted the ring around her finger as she talked to the group in her mind. She got a chorus of agreement in reply in her own mind and she continued forward.   
  


If they were lucky they could avoid all of the patrols all together and could get in and get out with their bounty no problem. But Daze felt it in her gut that this was not going to be that simple at all.

...  
  


Nempori was startled awake as he was every morning by the shouting and the clanging of bars as cells rattled open. He stood up and leaned on the wall for support as he watched the other men in his cell climb to their feet. His knees ached with bruises and he shivered in the cold room as the guard swung their door open and hit the switch to release their chains from the walls. The manacle around Nemporis ankle felt extra heavy today as he gathered up the chain the had fallen to the floor and tied it around his waist. He could feel the bite of the cold metal through his shirt but he knew that this was the best way to keep it out of the way as he worked in the fields.   
  


Nempori shuffled out after the other three, all of whom sported similar bruises to his as they joined with others in the hall that connected their cells. There were about fifty of them in total not including the dozen guards who would be with them for the day. They were herded into a large common area were they were handed their daily ration which consisted of leftovers from the Loth temples dinner the night before.   
  


The food was always cold but not terrible although the portions varried. On the days when the Loth priestesses did their fasting the slave rations were minuscule the next day. Aside from the one day a week they were assigned to serve the Loth priestesses, these fasting rations were the worst. Nempori looked down at the hard slice of bread in his hands with the quarter scoop of green mush on it and bit back a sigh. He would be hungry again well before the evening came.   
  


He ate quickly and was ready when the guards rounded them up to herd them to the field. Nempori heard the sound of whips cracking on those who were taking too long to finish their rations. The guards had little to no patience for the workers. No sympathy either as each and every guard had been in their position before and knew how things were supposed to go, had seen every trick in the book to get an extra few minutes of rest.   
  
Nempori never understood how they could be so callous though. They knew how hard fasting days were, how completely exhausted the field workers always are. He chalked it up to a self preserving selfishness though. Guards had done their time in the fields and had privileges as guards now that they didn’t have before. No chains, better rations, shoes and sturdier clothes. Nempori wasn’t so sure he wouldn’t be exactly like them if he were awarded those same privileges.   
  


As they left the main hall and left the stone structure, they were each handed a small shovel and the guards accompanying them received a spear in addition to the whip they always carried. Nempori tried to stay in the middle of the group so as to avoid the guards on the outer edges. They other field slaves were not kind to him but the guards were worse. He was hated more then the others and was often the target of their abuse on bad days, and fasting days were always bad days.

The five mile track to the fields was uneventful and Nemporis mind wandered back to his childhood, the source of his companions hatred for him. They assumed he was spoiled his first 8 years of life because he wasn’t tossed to the fields like every other male born to a priestess.   
  


Nemporis childhood was anything but luxury though. He was often hidden under the floorboards of his mother’s apartment as he listened to her abuse his father. His father was much like any other drow male aside from his spark of resistance. Nempori assumed that that was why his mother kept his father around so long. She loved how different he was from regular drow men. And she only kept Nempori because his father had begged her, often, to keep him. The priestess often used Nempori as leverage against his father to coerce him to bend to her will. Eventually he couldn’t take it any longer and became like the typical ductile male, broken and submissive. She had tossed him and Nempori away shortly after and Nempori never saw his father again.   
  


He was sure that he and his father were not the first and that they would not be the last that that awful woman would use and abuse till she broke them.   
  
“You, _Nempori_ , get over here.” A guard shouted and motioned for him. Nempori grimaced at the name. It was not the one his father gave him when he was born but was the mark of his enslavement, and he hated it. He shuffled over nonetheless though with his head down. His short and curly white hair covered his eyes a bit as he approached the surly guard. Every male slaves hair was short though. It was a symbol of their status, or lack of. Both Elves and Drow alike took great pride in their hair and the longer it was dignified power and refinement. For slaves like Nempori and the guards it was only kept just long enough for someone to grab a fist full of to pull.   
  


“You are on the edge today.” The guard said and shoved him toward the field before calling the next slave over. They were sorted into edge and middle field at random but everyone hoped for middle. The edge was where the guards circled and you were almost guaranteed to be beaten. Part of it was convenient outlet for aggression for the guards but the other part was to discourage runners, not that any of them any anywhere to run to anyway.   
  


Nempori hesitated before he gently lowered himself to his knees in front of one of the Gavia bushes to begin pruning and tending it. His knees groaned in protest as he kneeled on the bruises, and gritted his teeth as he began to dig around the roots to soften the dirt to help it grow. He could already feel his stomach begin to growl unhappily at him as the walk worked used most the energy from his meagre breakfast.

Hours passed and Nemporis head hurt as he worked as fast as he could to keep up with the demanding pace the guard near him set. He was hit a few times as he slowed and was grateful that he had taken his shirt off and tied it around his waist. At least he would have something to wear when they finished for the day. Had he kept it on, he knew the whip would have shredded the thin fabric quickly. By noon, Nempori was covered in a thin sheen of sweat and back trailed with welts and streaked blood.   
  


He kept going though. He had to. The last time he had fainted on an edge day he awoke to the worst whipping he had ever had in his life. A small part of him was grateful that he had the guards to punish them where as the guards were punished by the lower ranking priestesses. He wouldn’t wish it on anyone and he knew the guards fear of them spurred them the punish the field workers harder. If a fielder ran away, or died the punishment went to the guard in charge. Rarely did a priestess ever directly punish a fielder, but when they did, it was a fifty fifty wether they would survive the following day of field work. Nempori had seen men drop dead in the middle of the fields after being punished by a priestess the night before.   
  


He was lucky he has spent the first 8 years with one, he knew how to survive the wicked punishments that the Loth priestesses could deal with their twisted magic. He had only once been punish by a priestess after he arrived in the fields. He had tried to run after a particularly painful shift at the temple and the next day in the field he tried to bolt, but his injury’s slowed him significantly and he was caught by a guard embarrassingly fast.   
  


He would never run. Not after that. Whatever horror the priestess inflicted on them during their weekly shift, it was nothing compared to being truly punished by them. He was lucky to have survived at all.   
  


He was a paradox, the most lucky unlucky drow slave.

...

Daze called the group forward after a while of watching the guards and workers for a while. She had tried to make out their faces but aside from the shock of white hair contrasting their dark blue skin she couldn’t find any identifying features.

They had travelled for the better part of the day and avoided a couple patrols along the way thanks to her scouting a head. She had studied each guards face as they passed hoping to see the man in her nightmares, but she didn’t recognize any of them.

She watched the dark clothed guards around the large field shout commands of faster to the field working slaves. She saw whips crack every once in a while on the men that seemed to be taking too long. The guards were clad in dark clothing with a spear and whip while Daze could only make out the glint of a chain on the field workers and the shine of sweat on their bare backs as they worked. She doubted they had much aside from trousers and chains though.   
  


Gor-el and Thalia crouched beside Daze when they arrived, almost as silently as Daze had. That was largely due to Thalia’s nature magic and the way she made the very ground muffle their steps. Callissa and Opium flanked them and watched the field as well. 

Gor-el pulled the map from his pouch and began to sketch the clearing onto it.   
  


“We are almost there, only about five miles from the settlement.” He said and the paused as his dark eyebrows furrowed. He scratched at his left tusk that protruded from his bottom lip a little under an inch. Then he held up his hand with hugs arm outstretched and closed an eye as he began to more accurately measure the clearing. Daze still didn’t know how he measure and doubted that she could learn from him. His muscular arms were longer and his hands much larger and would only serve to throw off any measurements she took. After a moment he adjusted the map and did it again, his frown getting deeper each time.

”Spit it out Gor, what is it?” Callissa said and she flicked him to get his attention. He scowled that the tiefling warrior and held the map horizontally so they could all see. The clearing was hundreds of yards wide and long but as they looked at the map, Gor pointed out two rivers that ran down either side.

”The only way to the settlement is through this field unless we want to waste 4 days doubling back and going around the rivers.” He said and Daze looked up at the field filled drow guards and slaves and thousands of Giava berry bushes. Thalia had declared them safe to eat within the first day of arriving in the under dark and Daze immediately understood why the drow had cultivated a huge field of them. The black berries were sweet and filling, but she felt stupid now. Thalia had said that they could only grow near a water source. Daze now understood its position between the two rivers.

“I know this is going to be a dumb question, but why don’t we just cross the river and cut back here?” Opium asked as he pointed to various spots on the map. Gor-el pointed to an old note that he had _not_ made beside the river.   
  


_Aboleths_. Opium paled. And muttered a quick never mind.   
  


“It’s probably far enough away that the drow are relatively safe to work here but close enough to protect this field at its sides. I wouldn’t risk skirting around this field or cutting through the river.” Gor-el said and then pointed to the other river on the adjacent side. _Spark fish_. Not a good option either.

“Should we just wait till they leave for the night then?” Thalia suggested. Daze thought for a moment.   
  


“We could follow them as they leave that way they lead us right to the settlement.” Gor-el nodded and rolled the map up again.

”Good idea. Daze, you can disguise yourself as drow can’t you? That could be good cover incase you’re spotted.” Opium said as he sat down with a thud and pulled out a piece of dried meat to munch on. He looked almost like a halfling like that were it not for his closely trimmed beard and sticky figure. He was a rather young dwarf and preferred his facial hair short as opposed to the long beards of older dwarven men.   
  


“I think this one might require some invisibility.” She replied. “They might recognize if there is an extra slave there.” Daze settled back against a tree and took out some of her rations as well.

“Besides we have our rings and if things go wrong, I can tell you and Thalia can literally swoop in and save me like usual.” She said and Thalia smirks.

”Like usual.” Thalia agreed as she takes the ribbon hiking her dark braids set from her face out. They settle in with Callissa on watch as they wait for the guards to start herding the workers away from the field for the evening. 

...

At what Daze presumed to be dusk, after hours of hiding quietly in the tree line the guard began shouting and cracking their whips in unison and began to herd the slaves into a large group to presumably leave.   
  


“Keep quiet, I’ll tell you if anything happens.” Daze whispered to the others before she faded from their vision completely. She was an expert in the art of stealth, but invisibility took it to a whole new level. Almost nothing short of a dragon could detect her now.

She wove her way into the clearing and stepped silently across the short dark grass. Near her collarbone she felt a tongue flick against the skin and a soft voice entered her mind.   
  


_Close. I feel it, close._ Faust whispered in her mind and he coiled slightly around her upper arm again with only his head sticking out at the collar of her shirt. Faust. Her familiar. Halt didn’t know what it was about being invisible but Faust always got more chatty when he knew no one could see him. 

_Feel who Faust?_ She asked in reply as she crept forward, almost with in twenty meters of the slave group.

 _Him, from your night visions._ Faust hissed again in her mind and squeezed her arm even more. She could feel the waves of his excitement and anxiety through their telepathic bond. Her heart skipped a beat. For a magical familiar that was a living representation of her magic, he was always much more intuitive then she was. She trusted Faust completely.   
  


Not even a moment after Faust’s reply, her eyes locked onto one of the slave drow who had stumbled to the ground after a particularly hard shove. He landed in his back and she saw his face as he seemed to look right through her.   
  


It was him. I was the man from her nightmares. And she watched as the guard in front of her, not five feet away now brought his arm back, ready to strike the exhausted slave in front of him.

_Its him. If found him. Get ready to fight._ Daze said in her mind as she twisted the ring to communicate with her companions. A cacophony of replies rang around in her mind with a resounding _WAIT_!   
  


But she was already gripping the tail of the whip in her invisible hand as the drow prepared to swing forward, only to be caught mid action.   
  
The guard stumbled forward before whirling around to see who had held onto his whip, only to be greeted by nothing. Daze ducked under the guards swinging arm as he cursed in undercommon.   
  


Daze only knew a few words and phrases specifically for this mission and from her dreams and recognized the curses flying from the guards mouth as things she probably should never repeat. She side stepped a few on looking and terrified drow slaves and crouched beside the only familiar one, still laying on the ground and breathing heavily.   
  


“Suust, f'sarn natha abbil. (Quiet, I am a friend/trusted)” She whispered in his ear as she placed a hand on his shoulder, in what she thought was a comforting gesture. He had always received it well in her dreams anyway.   
  


Maybe that was because he could see her face then though in the privacy of just their minds. This was different though. Nempori was trained to expect pain when someone swore as loudly as the guard did now and the sudden shock of a woman’s voice in his ear coupled with a hand atop a fresh welt on his shoulder startled a loud shriek out of him.

Nempori jolted to his feet and swung his arm in an attempt to get away from the voice that was so unnervingly close to him.   
  


As his arm connected the drow guards and fielders around him caught their breath in unison as a fair skinned and silver haired woman skidded seeming out of nowhere on her hind end. Her dark leather armour and dark coated weapons that covered her slender figure only seemed to make her fair features stand out more as her pale hand clutched her cheek where a red mark began to bloom.

The woman stared shocked up at Nempori with her mouth agape and her bright green eyes darting from face to face as she realized her spell had just been _slapped_ away by thoroughly breaking her concentration on it.   
  


“You didn’t even make it out of the clearing Daze.” Another voice sounded behind the group as a looming and devil red tiefling warrior stood leaning against the hilt of her sword, it’s tip in the soft dirt. Guards readied their spears now as the realized there were _more_ of these strangers. None of them had ever seen a pale skinned woman before let alone a gigantic green half-orc, a short dwarven man with fiery red hair and spots across his skin, and large red tiefling with sharp curling horns atop her head. The last woman was strange in the way that her dark skin was a earth brown and not duck blue like theirs, but she lacked the pointed ears and sharp features of a elf, and her black hair was in cords with pieces of silver and gold though them.   
  


“Well, I didn’t expect him to hit me Cal.”   
Daze replied as she sprang to her feet and some of the drow men stumbled away from her.   
  


“You really know how to charm them don’t you Daze.” Opi laughed as his hands began to swirl with fire and as he raised them a massive wall of fire sprang from the earth behind the fielders and guards effectively cutting off any possible retreat.   
  


Nemporis eyes flashed between the other drow, the new figures that seemed to spring into existence and the woman who was now on her feet and pulling a scimitar from her belt. It was her. It was _her_. Nempori felt relief and anxiety surge through him at the same time.   
  


It was the woman from his dreams, she was real and here, and he had just _hit_ her. The strangers seemed to banter for a moment in a language he couldn’t understand before the small red haired man stretched out his hands and a wall of flame rose behind them, cutting off the path back to the city and their cells.   
  


The guards seemed to spring to action then and dove at the strangers with their spears with so much energy that Nempori know it was coming from a place of life or death self preservation. The fielders around him seemed to follow the same train of thought as she dove at the strangers with their meagre hand shovels. They had nothing to live for but nonetheless did each and every one of them want to _live_.

Daze sidestepped a few of the drow that leaped toward her easily and threw them to the side as if they weighed nothing and Nempori watched in a frozen trance as the woman who had spent countless hours holding him and trying to break his chains in his sleep was now moving with a grace and ferocity that he had not expected from her. She did not look like the silver angle from his dreams but a deadly shadow that whirled and left a wake of unconscious enemies in her wake.   
  


The battle lasted only minutes as the five strangers effectively incapacitated all 60+ drow whilst killing none of them. Early on in the battle Daze told them to only knock them out, not kill. These men were almost as innocent as civilians, and were just scared. The others huffed their agreement and eventually wether through magic or brute fire knock all but one unmoving drow out.   
  


Daze stood in front of Nempori now, her sword still crackling with thunder as she stepped closer to him. Nempori took an unconscious step back as she approached. She seemed more like an omen of death right now rather then the rescuing angle he’d dreamt of.   
  


Then she spoke. It was stilted and unpracticed, but it was in undercommon so he could understand.

”Xun dos zhaun uns'aa?(Do you know me?)” Daze asked and Nempori watched as she slow resheathed her sword. Nempori nodded and gulped his eyes flickering to her closely watching companions. They terrified him, and if over 60 of his peers couldn’t defend them, he had less then zero chance if they decided to turn on him as well.   
  


“Vel'bol zhah dosst kaas? (What is your name?)” She asked again and gently stepped closer as if he were a cornered dog about to bolt (which in that moment , he felt very close to doing). Nempori furrowed his eyebrows and bit his lip as he felt his cheeks flush a bright purple and he cast his eyes to the floor. Of all things he should have expected that question but it was the one he least wanted to answer. After a moment he did.

”Nempori.”   
  


“... I am _not_ calling you that.”

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**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter deleted half way though and it was the most frustrating thing in my life! I hope you guys like this though!

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first work Yall! I hope you like it!!


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